


Wounds

by orphan_account



Category: Fire Emblem: Soen no Kiseki/Akatsuki no Megami | Fire Emblem Path of Radiance/Radiant Dawn
Genre: F/F, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-17
Updated: 2015-10-17
Packaged: 2018-04-26 21:02:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5020432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are some wounds that Mist can't mend, no matter how well she understands them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wounds

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dubious_diskette](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dubious_diskette/gifts).



When the battle has ended, the mercenaries and Crimean regulars slowly regroup on a broad hill, high enough not to be waterlogged. Such land will no doubt be much sought after, Mist knows, when the army departs but the water remains. Water, and blood. The land around her is drenched in both, she thinks, and littered with corpses that may not be gathered for days. Talrega, or what she can see of it, has taken on the appearance of a swamp. Mist cannot imagine an empty wagon being able to traverse it, let alone one laden with bodies stacked like cordwood.

When she toured the supply wagons with her brother at the start of the campaign, the sight of their contents, and the implications of such, had numbed her. The rations had seemed endless, enough for a lifetime, until Ike quietly told her that they would only meet most of the need of an army of thousands over weeks or months of campaigning, and that many of their meals would be scavenged or outright plundered as they carved a bloody path from the border of Daein to its capitol. There had been weapons packed in barrels and in crates, and the sight of so much dull iron and gleaming steel had wrought a dense knot of nausea in the pit of her stomach. The thought of the uses so many weapons would be put to had been heavy in her mind when they came to one of the last wagons. There had been books -- tomes for calling on wind and fire and lightning -- and, stacked in corded bundles beside them, staves beyond counting. Polished to a shine and topped with expertly cut quartz, they were like nothing Mist had seen before. She couldn’t imagine how much they had cost. She couldn’t imagine so many being needed.

Now, she has lost count of the staves she has exhausted. Mist cannot remember how many she has used over the course of this _battle_ , let alone the entire war thus far. 

Mist heals. She tries to focus everything on the mechanics of drawing out the stave’s energy, and not on the ruined forms on the pallets in front of her. She has done this often enough that the magic seems to go where it’s needed almost instinctively, and so she only has to glance at the bodies once before she mends them. This helps.

Mist is not the only healer in the camp. Rhys is here, and with the Crimean soldiers came professionally trained healers. All of them, and Mist herself, wear heavily scented cloth masks over their noses and mouths. This is meant to help with the smell, and it does, though Mist is beginning to associate the smell of hydrangeas with the sight of corpses. 

The day wears on. Mist’s arms get tired. The steady flow of wounded soldiers -- some still able to walk up the hill under their own power, others carried by their brethren -- slows to a trickle. Between the blood, the sweat, and the sickly smell of rich farmland turned to mud, Mist knows that her clothes will probably need to be replaced and burned. 

Mist has not spent nearly as much time actually _fighting_ as her brother and the rest of their family have, but Ike has told her that sometimes -- not always, but sometimes -- he finds himself not needing to think about what he does in battle. That sometimes, he finds himself just going through the motions. Mist cannot imagine killing so casually -- so mindlessly -- but, in the wake of the battle, when all there is to do is move from one rent body to the next and activate the stave in her hands, she finds herself losing track of time. She finds herself not thinking, and that is why Rhys’s hand falling on her shoulder is such a jolt to her that she nearly drops her stave. When she turns to face him, and sees that is _is_ him, it takes her a moment to adjust and calm down.

“One of the scouts from Phoenicis spotted a wyvern rider heading this way,” Rhys says. “They think it’s your friend.” Mist isn’t sure how, exactly, but she definitely reacts visibly, as Rhys adds, “Go ahead, we don’t have many wounded left.”

A month ago, Mist would have been ashamed at the way she feels right now: worried at even the possiblity that Jill might be hurt, when until now she has been healing the actual, non-hypothetical wounds of countless strangers. But Mist has already had to choose, more than once, to save her brother or one of the mercenaries over equally hurt allies who happened to have the bad luck not to be personally acquainted with her. So she just sets the staff aside and leaves the tent.

When she pulls the tent flap aside and steps through, it takes her a moment to adjust to the sunlight. She can see again just in time to watch Jill and her wyvern making as gentle and graceful a landing as Mist is accustomed to seeing.

In the early hours of the battle, before the stream of wounded into the camp grew to the extent that Mist had to focus on healing to the exclusion of all else, Jill’s dilemma had been at the front of her mind. She had asked her brother not to pressure her to go to the front, and both Ike and Jill herself had told her before the battle started that Ike had suggested to Jill that she say off the front lines. It is only now, in the wake of the battle and of the army licking its wounds, that Mist realizes that Jill’s father has either surrendered, or is dead.

\--

In Jill’s tent, Mist sits at the end of Jill’s bedroll, watching her remove her armor. Without fail, this has always made her feel awkward and self-conscious. She has seen her brother and Titania do the same thing countless times, and it isn’t as though Jill isn’t wearing a layer of leather underneath, and another of wool beneath that, and who knows what else (Mist certainly tries not to think about it) underneath _that_. But there is something about Jill Fizzart removing her armor that sets Mist just a little on edge. Even given the context.

“My father is dead,” Jill says in a steady voice. She isn’t looking at Mist as she unbuckles her steel breastplate from her chest. Mist can’t see the older girl’s face.

Mist understands that her situation and Jill’s are completely different. Her father was butchered by a glorified assassin in the dead of night, and even had she been there, she couldn’t have done a thing to stop it. Jill was there, and spoke to her father, and even fought him for a time, before Ike arrived at the scene and finished the job himself. Mist knows, because Ike told her, looking as sick as she felt at his words, as she feels now.

It isn’t the same. “I’m sorry,” Mist says. It’s barely more than a whisper.

Jill has removed vambraces, mail, and more. Even her hair is hanging loose, something that Mist has only rarely seen. In just her flying leathers, with her hair unbound and hanging down to the small of her back, Jill looks strange. Mist watches her pull her gloves off. “I was there,” she says, and then turns around. She’s crying, with a pale hand held over her eyes and her mouth a bitter line.

Mist is up and on her feet in a moment, and near Jill in another. “I’m sorry,” she says again, uselessly. She feels as though she should be doing someting with her hands, but she doesn’t know what.

This problem is solved for her when Jill moves, wrapping her arms around Mist and burying her face in Mist’s shoulder. As Jill begins to sob in earnest against Mist’s shirt, Mist’s hands slowly -- tentatively, like she’s afraid of being burned -- find their places against the small of Jill’s back and just below her neck. “I, I fought him, and, and I was _happy_ , because I could see how _proud_ he was, and,” and Jill’s body shudders. 

Mist is lost. She’s been lost since the war started, since they left Crimea, since her father died. She has no idea what she’s supposd to do, not without a staff in her hands. Her shirt is wet with Jill’s tears, and she’s more aware of Jill’s mouth’s movements ghosting against her collarbone when she speaks than she’s ever been of anything in her life, and the blood Jill hasn’t had a chance to wash off her leather yet is getting all over Mist’s clothes. “I’m so sorry.” 

Jill looks up at her, and her face is very, very close to Mist’s. “It was your brother,” Jill says. Her face is a puffy mess of sweat and tears and her hair is clinging to it. Mist feels a situationally inappropriate urge to press her lips against Jill’s mouth. As Jill’s words register, however, dread twists in Mist’s chest. “He was the one who finished it. I heard him draw his sword,” and one of Jill’s gloved hands rises to grip Mist’s shoulder before she continues, “and I stepped aside when I saw him, and Father _nodded_ to me, and then, he...”

It is good that Mist has what she thinks is a basically accurate idea of what happened, because at this point Jill just dissolves. All Mist can do is stare down at her, stroke her hair, and try to resist the urge to just keep repeating that she’s sorry. 

\--

They march with the rest of the army, Mist leading her horse by the reins beside her and Jill occasionally glancing up at where her wyvern is spiralling overhead the steadily advancing army. Talrega is hours behind even the stragglers.

“Your brother told me,” Jill says, “that he would understand if I sought revenge, or if I left.” When Mist looks at her, Jill’s eyes are on the air, watching her wyvern, or looking for something else.

Mist’s heart can’t decide whether it wants to sink like a stone or stop beating on the spot. “Are you -- I mean, I -- my brother, he isn’t very _tactful_.” She bites her lip. “What did you tell him?”

Jill looks at her, face neutral, then seems to nearly smile at what she sees. “Oh, I just kept crying.” She looks at the ground. “That’s all I’ve really done in the past couple of days, since...well, I’m glad we’re leaving Talrega.” 

Before what happened in the tent -- or what almost happened -- Mist would have moved over and given Jill a quick hug. Now, she just sighs. “Yeah.”

Jill is silent for a while. Then, “I’m not going to, though.”

Mist’s heart rises, or starts beating again, or whichever. “Leave, or...?” She doesn’t even want to say it.

“Neither.” Jill scratches her neck. “None of this would have happened if not for Ashnard’s invasion. Your brother and that Crimean noble are already planning to take his head off his shoulders, so I might as well tag along for the ride.” She looks at Mist, and really does smile, even if it’s a bitter one. “Just...I hope you’re not offended if I don’t spend much time around your brother. I know you two are close, and I like _you_ , but I can’t see him and not think about my Father.” 

Mist nods. They walk in silence, Mist thinking about her father, and Jill probably doing the same.


End file.
